Schott v. Bexar County: jury finds county policy behind an unconstitutional stop flagged by a fusion center

In March 2022, Bexar County Sheriff's Office Deputy Joel Babb stopped Houston resident Alek Schott on I-35 while he drove home from a business trip, and deputies searched his truck. "No drugs were found," the magistrate judge's February 2026 report says. The report describes how Schott was picked: the "Laredo Fusion Center," which Sheriff Javier Salazar described as a police-intelligence unit, "took notice of Schott's trip" and told the county's Criminal Interdiction Unit he had made a "one-day turnaround," and an informant known only as "Kiki" passed it to Babb.

On Sept 28, 2026, a federal jury in San Antonio (No. 5:23-cv-00706, Judge Orlando L. Garcia) found that an officer with Babb's information would not have had reasonable suspicion for the stop or for extending it, that deputies searched the truck without probable cause, and that a Bexar County policy or custom was the "moving force" behind all three, one a county policymaker knew or should have known about. It awarded the $76 Schott asked for.

Schott, represented by the Institute for Justice, says "a license plate reader flagged his truck" and that the tip came through "a private WhatsApp group chat." His summary-judgment motion, citing deputies' depositions, says each interdiction car carried four plate readers that fed "a vast database of scans from other agencies and commercial sources." The jury was not asked about plate readers.

How we know: Verdict form, the magistrate judge's report and Schott's filings read directly. The fusion-center flag is the court's account; the plate-reader and WhatsApp details are Schott's, and the jury was not asked about them. Judgment not yet entered as of Oct 1, 2026; post-trial motions and appeal are open.